The suspects allegedly charged up to 3,000 euros for a pass mark in the theory test, even though many of the pupils could neither read nor write.

The Guardia Civil in Granada and Ciudad Real rounded up 50 people, only five of whom belonged to the gang and the rest were people who had benefited from the ‘arrangement.’ The police believe that there are more people involved than those that have obtained their driving licences fraudulently in this manner scattered around, Jañen, Las Palmas, Sevilla and Córdoba.

The objective of the Forgery Five was to act as middlemen between the aspirants and the contact in the Jefatura de Tráfico. This person, who belonged to a company subcontracted by the Jefatura, substituted the real test marks for the ‘more favourable’ ones. The said contact, who is allegedly the head of the operation, is a security guard.

The security guard has worked for the last twelve years at his post in the Jefatura where he had gained the confidence of those around him. Part of his job was guarding the test-result archives, so it would have been very easy for him to swap the test results.

Just about all of the people who took advantage of this dodgy offer were illiterate or almost illiterate

Apparently, in Ciudad Real, where two of the gang scouted for clients, the operation was an open secret, so many aspirants requested to have their theory exam transfered to that city and once obtained, they did the practice test in their own city, hence the operation covering several provinces.

(News: Metropolitan Area, Granada, Andalucia)